Post-It notes from the papal kitchen

By Diogenes ( articles ) | Jan 22, 2004

Date: 6 December 2003
To: Zofi
From: Stan
Re: Last night's dinner

The boss said the soup was good. Nice work.

Date: 8 December 2003
To: Sr. Zofia
From: JNV
Re: Super Soup

Rina told me the Pope thought your soup was the hit of Friday's meal. Any chance of my getting the recipe?

Date: 17 December 2003
To: Sr. Z. M.
From: +Stanislaw Dziwisz
Re: Terrible error

Marcello over at L'Avvenire claims the Holy Father used the word "good" of the soup you prepared for his supper on 5 December. Impossible. Can't imagine where he got the idea.

Date: 22 December 2003
To: Sr. Zofia
From: JNV
Re: From the housetops

Still hearing from all sides about your famous bouillabaise. You should chisel the word "Good!" on the plinth above your stove.

Date: 18 January 2004
To: Sr. M. Zofia Mesczynski, O.S.F.,
From: M. Rev. Msgr. Stanislaw Dziwisz, titular Archbishop of San Leone
Re: Baseless Rumors

I categorically repudiate any suggestion that Pope John Paul II, in his capacity of Bishop of Rome, expressed any opinion whatsover regarding the products of your kitchen. I look to you to contradict all reports to the contrary.

Date: 20 January 2004
To: All Kitchen Personnel of the Pontifical Household
From: Dr. Joaquin Navarro-Valls
Re: Clarification

His Holiness is not in the habit of delivering judgments of a gastronomic nature on particular items of his diet. Suggestions that he used a term of approbation in discussing his meals have their origins in the difficulty of understanding his speech due to impairment brought on by the Parkinson's disease which he doesn't have. The claim that he would have intended the word "good" in a positive sense is preposterous prima facie and does not merit credibility. A memorandum indicating the contrary that purports to have been issued from my office is a transparent forgery.